


Beautiful History

by Angelicalangie



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-13
Updated: 2012-04-09
Packaged: 2017-11-03 09:11:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/379711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angelicalangie/pseuds/Angelicalangie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Events on New Caprica return to haunt Kara</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Kdbleu who provided in seven words a prompt that kinda went out of control when I was writing, I know that the minimum is 1,000 I was given such an interesting concept I went what, 11 times that? I know that I have gone pretty easy on the creep factor for Leoben, that is to make him easier for pure K/L or people squicked by Leoben to deal with the narrative.

  


Title Beautiful History (1/2)  
Author [](http://angelicalangie.livejournal.com/profile)[**angelicalangie**](http://angelicalangie.livejournal.com/)  
Summary: Events on New Caprica return to haunt Kara  
Characters Lee, Kara, Cottle, Adama, Sam, Helo, Leoben, Simon, OFC.  
Rating Teen  
Length: 11,882  
Warnings Light dub-con, definitely an amount of Stockholm Syndrome in the beginning. Mentions of Kara's relationship with her mother. Mentions of “The Farm”. If I have left anything else out, I am really sorry  
Beta: Many, many thanks to the wonderfully encouraging [](http://embolalia.livejournal.com/profile)[**embolalia**](http://embolalia.livejournal.com/) who also managed to catch silly mistakes and tell me where I may make things more cohesive and realistic and just was a fantastic Beta. Thank you, you made this something that I am damned proud of!  
Author Notes: Thank you to Kdbleu who provided in seven words a prompt that kinda went out of control when I was writing, I know that the minimum is 1,000 I was given such an interesting concept I went what, 11 times that? I know that I have gone pretty easy on the creep factor for Leoben, that is to make him easier for pure K/L or people squicked by Leoben to deal with the narrative.  
Also a debt of gratitude to Taragel and SciFiShipper who were gracious when I asked for an extension. Also a personal thanks to a friend Katie, who helped me keep momentum and offered words of encouragement. This is the story that NEVER wanted to end, and at the end I didn't want it to, either. I hope you enjoy, I certainly did!

 

 

**Prologue**

 

Relief floods through Kara as the child in front of her opens her eyes and looks up at her. It's a mo-ment that she’s been hoping for from the moment she found Kacey on stairs. She screamed then; she’s smiling now with relief. She sinks backwards and Leoben is there, ready and waiting. This time she doesn't flinch, she knows he is there - that he has been there through the whole mess. A part of her knows he is the one that created the situation himself, but the bigger part, the part that loves Kacey as her own now, doesn't care.

A Simon comes in and begins to check over Kacey, taking her vitals and making notations on a chart. Kara’s back begins to stiffen and Leoben notices her change in behaviour. He guides her to a seat and Kara watches numbly from the sidelines as Leoben discusses Kacey's prognosis. A shiver runs through her as she watches them converse, as she watches the Simon's hands with horrified fascination and remembers them on her own skin. The brief tête a tête concludes and the Simon leaves the room; Leoben returns to Kara's side.

“He'll be back soon, he wants to keep an eye on her since she lost consciousness for so long,” Leoben says, sitting next to Kara.

“He creeps me out.” It's a flat statement and she says it so quietly that if Leoben didn't have superior hearing he may not have heard it.

She feels the lack of warmth as he moves away and out of the door and she is left with the sounds of the monitor, of Kacey's breathing and her own in the room. Dragging a chair from one side of the room to the bed, she settles and watches Kacey watching her. Moments pass in time as child and woman gaze at each other, as 'mother' strokes 'daughter’s' hair and a bond deepens. Kara knows now that she will never allow any harm to befall her little girl. Wonderment fills her when she real-ises she thinks of Kacey as her little girl, but she focuses once again on Kacey and her needs.

Leoben re-enters the room and takes Kara's hands, pulling them behind her. The coolness of shack-les binds her wrists together and she knows they’re leaving Kacey's side. Part of her rejoices at it, but she also wants to struggle, wants to fight to protect Kacey from the bogey man that the Simons present in her mind. It’s only when a Six appears, gentle in her appearance, that Kara relaxes enough to be ushered from the room.

***

They arrive back at their mockery of a home and Leoben releases her wrists so that she can walk down the stairs. Kara looks back at him as he shuts the door. Something has changed between them, something she can't quantify, but it’s there. She walks to the kitchen through the dining and living area and runs some water into a glass. She brings it to her lips and drinks it down greedily as though she is dehydrated. She finishes the glass sets it down, but it hasn't alleviated the feeling that is rising and beginning to take over her. Leoben turns her by her shoulder and looks her in the eye. He raises his hands to her face and kisses her tenderly on the forehead.

Perhaps it is exhaustion, perhaps it is being overwrought, perhaps it is a lot of things but she melts into him, wraps her arms around him – this machine who plays man – and in the moment it, he, whatever he is, gives her a sense of solace she hasn't had since her father left. She clings to that in her emotional turbulence. She lifts her head and returns his kiss and a chemistry that has built from the day she tortured him on that godsforsaken ship - whose name she has long forgotten - ignites, sparking a fire of touch and taste and a cataclysm of emotion that would never exist beyond this moment.


	2. Chapter One

**Chapter One**

She steps off the raptor with Kacey in her arms, the small, precious and warm body melded into hers. Kara tightens her grip a little more as she looks down and descends to the deck floor and gazes about her. Sam wanders up behind her from within the raptor her, happy to be reunited with her, but Kara turns, almost imperceptibly, but enough to send a large enough message that he isn’t welcome. This is a moment with her daughter. She looks down at Kacey lovingly; she doesn’t notice the crowd thin a little in her area until she hears a female voice.

Within moments Kacey is gone, never her child. All the love Kara poured into the little girl means nothing. All that is left is the question of how to fill a child-shaped hole in your heart, when that child was never your flesh and bone. It felt like Kacey was her child. Kara’s arms feel empty as she relinquishes her to Julia, questions flooding her eyes. There are no answers forthcoming and Sam’s concern for her irritates until she twists away from him, the first step of their pattern. His concern and gentility and love can’t touch her emotional blank slate, only it isn’t as blank as she would like to think.

The hurt that begins that day twists and morphs into something she doesn’t even have a word set for. She sows seeds of discontent with Tigh, a man she has never particularly liked before. She feels nothing for the life she had before, nothing for the people in it who desert her now, watching from the periphery as time passes and she descends into a second personal hell.

How can she tell anyone what had happened, that she is ashamed of the feelings she had for the toaster, the way he manipulated her into loving him, into thinking she had a child. The experience has left her a remnant; all she is now is a shell of the person that she was. That child is with another woman and she, Kara Thrace, is not the mother. It’s strange, it’s weird, it’s twisted, it’s frakked. She never wanted to be a mother, but in a few short weeks, weeks she let that twisted pile of circuits into her heart, she became a mother and she loved it – even if the spectre of Kacey scared her - though she’d rip anyone’s tongue out if they said it to her face, or behind her back.

She’s not just wrestling with the situation, the effects of being kept in detention, the botched sui-cide, the multiple murders, and the accident with Kacey. She’s dealing with the lack of control and the submission; she hates herself for that most of all. She goes round and round and round in circles, reliving, trying to work out a different ending, some new clue that means that she isn’t responsible, that she had no choice but to love Leoben. Each night she finds herself in a closet or a small space, willing herself to die whilst daring herself to drink into oblivion only to succeed in failing and hating herself all the more.

Kara spends her life in a haze of misery buried under layers of anger and spite and bitterness. She had hoped that she would come back to a life like she’d had, but the world moved on without her, and she doesn’t know how to deal with it. She rises now each morning with what reminds her of a hangover, vomiting, and shrugs it off to the long hours, the terrible food and the enforced life of sobriety the toaster made her live. Another thing she hates him for. Everything she eats or does now rebounds on her in some manner, and it is all a reflection of New Caprica and the Cylons. The mis-ery compounds in on itself when she sees Kacey in passing. The child that could have been hers. She never wanted to be a mother and now, now there is a yearning that wouldn’t exist had Leoben not interfered and meddled.

One morning she rolls out of the bunk that she shares with Sam, the gods know why, and heads straight for the sink they have. She heaves again - she can’t stop - and it lifts her to her toes with a feeling as though she is pulling everything up from in her torso. Sam watches from the bunk, blank-faced. He knows this time it isn’t from alcohol. They had had a fight last night and she stayed with him out of spite. She didn’t drink, she partook in her other addiction. She fought and frakked him instead.

“Kara, you’ve thrown up like that for the last five weeks, there has to be something wrong. You know the amount of illnesses that were going around back on that planet. You should see Doc Cot-tle.” He rolls back on the bunk and looks at the ceiling.

Kara wipes her mouth with her sleeve. “I don’t feel ill.”

“Kara you were violently ill, and you don’t feel ill.” Disbelief tinges Sam’s voice, as if he doesn’t know what to do anymore. It’s almost like living with an angry wraith; she isn’t the Kara he mar-ried, certainly not the one he met on Caprica.

Silence encapsulates the room; it sits itself between them as though it is a third person in their mar-riage. Time passes and the implications of their conversation, if one could call it that, lay heavy. With a thump Sam breaks the silence by throwing a pillow at the wall opposite him. Kara knows she should be startled, should be wary, but she barely bats an eye.

“You are going to Doc Cottle.” His voice is definite; the job is done, finished and over.

Kara doesn’t care anymore; she goes with him out of some motivation she cannot even place, per-haps she is just doing it to placate him, out of duty, lacking the will to fight anymore. They walk the halls in silence, staying out of the way of people. Sam smiles at friends, promises to get back to them, but says that he has something important to do. Kara hears him, hears him say important and some small part of her registers that she is the ‘something important’, but her whole life suddenly feels as though she’s swimming through mud, a ghost in her own life. She wonders when she is ever going to snap out of this, or if this is it.

They enter life-station together, or as together as two strangers can be. It’s quiet in there and as Kara feels Sam leave her side to look for the doctor, she looks around, not out of interest, but out of a lack of anything else to do. She picks up paperwork, but can barely read it. She supposes it would be like the good Doc trying to read the engineering schematics to one of the vipers.

“Would you put that down, there is nothing there for a pilot, even one with no flight status like yourself, to read.” Cottle walks over to her before she has the opportunity to put the paperwork down and takes it out of her hands. “Well, what have you got yourself into that your husband won’t even talk about it?” His irascibility is palpable, but it doesn’t diminish an air of caring.

“I’m puking my brains out. It’s the food, I know it is,” Kara says sullenly, making it clear she in no way wants to be there.

“It's going to take your system a while to get used to things up here, Starbuck. Take it easy on your-self.” He turns to Sam. “Are you trying to waste my time?”

Sam blanches a little, but he has had worse, and this is Kara they are talking about – his wife, no matter how messed up she is. “I am not sold on the food theory. I’m not ill.”

The doctor turns to Kara, who is looking at Sam, her eyes throwing out silent messages that could range from traitor to get me out of here, but Sam is so far removed from her these days that he just isn’t receiving it.

“Everybody's system is different, but it can't hurt to see if there is something else going on I sup-pose.” Cottle says looking at her, but Kara won’t look him in the eye. The lack of answer confirms everything to Cottle and so he starts to think and begins to draw up a chart. “Sit on that bed Star-buck, and do not move.” His voice has become authoritative, and somehow it penetrates the static in her mind just enough for her to follow the order and do as she is told.

A nurse comes and begins drawing blood, and as Kara looks at it flowing into the tube, she’s whisked back to Leoben’s blood spurting out of his neck as he died, gasping for air like a fish out of water. She looks at her own hands; they are clean as they should be. The nurse has her fill and with-draws the needle and moves off. Kara begins to wipe her hands on her pants. In her mind’s eyes she has his blood on them, drying, making her fingers stiff.

Sam watches her silently and realises that he is creeping inexorably towards his tolerance levels. He can’t make out what is going on in her head any more than she can it seems. She has shut down so much he would be amazed if she ever opened up. He looks at her and begins to feel pity for her, she became the bird in a gilded cage, and even though she has left it physically, she hasn’t mentally. He wonders if she ever will. He wants to keep trying, wants to be with her, will allow her to do almost anything. He wonders, looking off into the distance, what his breaking point is.

Time passes slowly in life-stations, but Sam stays just so that Kara does. That said he wishes she would at least talk to him, even argue, just show some kind of response. He is left with his thoughts too often these days, and that was never his thing. Kara fidgets, playing with her hands. It’s such an unusual behaviour for her that for a moment Sam is stunned. He becomes fascinated, so much so that he doesn’t notice the Doc coming up on them.

“So, we have the preliminary results of your tests, Starbuck,” the Doctor begins. Kara looks at him and the world that seemed so distant slows down. She knows something is up, just looking at him. “You don’t have any sickness, at least so far that we have on our prelim, that’s your first piece of news.”

Kara feels vindicated and looks at Sam victoriously. “I told you it was the food and stress, I just need to get used to it,” she hisses. Deep down she knows he was trying to do the right thing, but she feels like a fool.

“It’s not the food, nor the stress, Starbuck, you’re pregnant.” Cottle’s words hang in the air like un-wanted birthday balloons. Sam is stunned, Kara just feels lost, the world falling out from under her.

“I’m on the shot, just like everyone else.” It’s a desperate plea; he has to have gotten it wrong.

“You weren’t whilst you were on New Caprica, you just didn’t have the access, and when you were captured I hardly doubt the Cylons thought it was a pertinent action.” Cottle doesn’t notice that Kara pales just a little bit; he keeps going. “Starbuck, you probably got pregnant in the celebration when you got back, in the week or so before you restarted the shot.” He places two bottles on the bed. “These are the best I can give you in prenatal care. Take one a day.” He backs out of the cur-tained area and leaves the couple to their own devices.

“Well, that’s just perfect Kara, frakking perfect.” Sam gets up, staring at his wife, who now seems alien to him. “Last frakking night was the first night you deigned to frak me. You've treated me like the frakking plague!” His voice is hushed, harsh and angry. “So who’s the father Kara, Lee? Some-one else? Anyone else? A deck hand! The whole frakking ship knows that you got back and frakked the first thing to come to mind. Frak, your pre-nuptual frak was Lee. What did he do? Turn you away last night and I became sloppy seconds?”

It snaps Kara out of her malaise and she looks up at Sam, a tear rolling down her cheek. It gives Sam some pause but it isn’t enough to stop him walking out the door. Kara watches him leave and fiercely wipes her tears away as she pulls the typical Starbuck facade over her features, a facade that has been missing for so long. There is something more going on, something is tickling at the back of her mind, but she doesn’t want to pay attention to it. A part of her is revelling in the idea that this is her second chance at being a mother. Kacey was taken from her, but now she has this child.

She follows Sam out the door and down the corridor until she is on his heels at a run. Something has taken over her, something has changed, and the child-shaped hole in her world is being filled. It isn’t a replacement, but is something that is hers and hers alone. She won’t question this, even though something is nagging at her. She steps into her quarters and into the storm that is raging in her husband.

“What, you couldn’t keep it in your pants long enough that we could be together?” Sam is pacing angrily. Kara’s never seen him like this before and she isn’t going to say a thing.

She sits down on their bed as he spews venom at her. It’s nothing she hasn’t heard before. It’s eve-rything she knew would happen. It was just a matter of time. She is reminded of all the times that her mother told her she was no good, a cancer, and a frak-up. Look at where she is now, frakking up a marriage – then again, if she really thought about it she married Sam more out of fear than love.

“Is there any chance that it’s Leoben’s? I mean you seem to frak anyone, why not him?” Sam is throwing stuff in a bag hard and fast, and by the time Kara really looks at him she sees that he is completely packed.

“Well here is the offer,” he says finally, but his voice is now deadly calm and she wishes he would return to angry because then at least she would know what she was dealing with. There is no trace of the Sam she loved so long ago.

“You get rid of the thing that is within you, that tumour, or we are done.” He suddenly realises that of all the things she could have done, getting knocked up by another guy is the one thing that would break him. He loves her even now, but how can he be near her, especially if this is Lee's child. A part of him believes it is, not even a suspicion.

Kara looks at him, really looks at him, there is disbelief in her eyes but as she sees he means it, her hand goes to her flat abdomen protectively. She remembers the loss she felt when Kacey was taken away and Leoben’s game was shown for what it was: something to weaken her resolve.

“I’m not getting rid of it. For one thing it’s illegal, thanks to Roslin,” Kara shouts for all to hear. Sam looks at her and realises that she’s serious. He walks over to her and kneels down in front of her; gently he places his hands on her shoulders and looks her in the eyes beseechingly.

“I know people who can do this, who will make everything right again. It isn’t like you ever wanted children before.” Sam thinks he is making some headway until Kara looks him in the eyes. Some-thing has changed, there is an impenetrable wall and he just hit it. Gods knew what Leoben did to her, but something about her is different now. She looks like she’s about to dig her heels in and make trenches.

“No.” It’s quiet in comparison to all the shouting they’ve done during their marriage. “I won’t go to some former backstreet butcher. I’m not losing this child, too.” Sam’s face becomes perplexed and Kara shrugs inwardly; she isn’t going to bother explaining that to him. He’d understand more, she figures, if he knew her better. She negates the idea that he would know more, perhaps even under-stand her, if she opened up to him. If it’s over as he’s said, she isn’t going to lay herself bare to him. She’s done as well.

“You’re throwing us away over someone else’s baby?” It’s louder than Kara was expecting and she flinches away. Sam rocks back on his haunches before walking to his bags. He can hardly believe the fact that she isn’t even defending herself. He moves to the door and opens it. Outside their quarters people are moving about freely, going about their lives, unaware that his is imploding. As he steps out of the hatch Kara’s voice sounds finally and his heart skips a beat hoping she has come to her senses.

“Sam, not someone else’s baby. My baby. I don’t care who the father is. This is my baby first and foremost. Don’t forget that.” She stands finally and moves to the half bare wardrobe and positions her clothes in the centre and does something she rarely does. She tidies.

***

Hours pass, and that niggling feeling returns, Sam’s words return to her: “Is there any chance it’s Leoben’s?” Her first reaction is to be repulsed, but her instincts tell her the truth. Her memory floats and she is back in that hospital, back watching Kacey, unconscious and bandaged. She was the one that held his hand there, she made the move. You couldn’t call it love, but she doesn’t know what else you could call it.

They had returned to the apartment on the say-so of a Simon. Just looking at him had reminded her of the farms on Caprica, and almost as though sensing it Leoben dragged her away. Kacey was safe, she was being tended to, she’d woken up, and she’d be home soon. They got back and Kara had sagged, had landed on the floor and sobbed, listing all her failings, finally broken. Leoben had taken advantage of it all, but then so had she. She had taken advantage of the slightest comfort she could get – and for a moment forgot who was giving it. She hadn’t told him she loved him though, that had come much later, her last bargaining chip, and now ... now she found he had an even better one. Had he known?

It’s a thought that makes her restless, and like a tiger she prowls her quarters, suddenly feeling trapped like she was at the doll house. Kara grabs a bottle of ambrosia, more out of habit than any-thing else. She runs out of her quarters, not paying any heed as to who’s around.

A man watches her dash out of the quarters, and has half a mind to follow her, but he knows that she is better left alone. He’s still so bitterly angry towards her that whatever words he gave her would be damaging and not what she needed.

Walking the corridor he finds himself at the new makeshift bar that has sprung up, Joe’s. He walks in and takes in the tableau: Sam shooting pyramid scores, a dark look on his face. Lee sits on the opposite side of the bar and buys a shot of Ambrosia. He leans on the bar and listens to the gossip; he isn’t one to spread it, but knowing the hot spots tends to avoid issues later on.

“Sam’s back here then,” a male voice speaks, chuckling.

“Yeah, you’d think being married to Starbuck he’d be at home.” The innuendo threads its way into what the man is saying, raising Lee’s hackles.

“Yeah well, I saw him leaving with a packed bag and Starbuck shouting something about, ‘Not someone else’s baby, her baby.’ Perhaps she’s been playing away from home and got caught.” Lee can hear the shrug in the voice. He doesn’t care. He drinks the shot in one gulp, slams the glass on the bar and leaves. As he walks out he puts together the look Kara wore when he saw her and the story he had just heard. He was wrong before; she shouldn’t be left on her own right now.

 


	3. Chapter Two

**Chapter Two**

Kara sits back against the wall, the viewing port to one side. The room is long deserted by the hordes that used to love admiring the view; the novelty has long worn off. In her hands is a bottle of ambrosia, the glass warm, but she hasn’t tasted a sip. Her head rests on the wall behind her as she schools her breathing from angered and laboured to calm. She tilts her head and looks at the join between ceiling and wall, her breath still shaky from her anger. She looks out the corner of her eye and regards the starscape, once as familiar as a lover’s caress and now foreign and forbidden.

She doesn’t know what to do. Sam’s demands – on the one hand – seemed so rational. This baby shouldn’t exist, it’s an unnatural occurrence. What he’s proposing though is equally unnatural, not to mention, she smiles grimly, unlawful. She looks downward at her still flat stomach; one day, she surmises, this won’t be so flat. She doesn’t know where her anger lies. Is it with Leoben, who tricked her into a facsimile of love – but never the real thing? Could it be she’s angry at Sam, who wants her to throw away something living – no matter its origins? Or Lee, who saw her pain the day Julia took Kacey from her arms and yet did nothing but walk past her?

She sits that way for a time, despondent in her disequilibrium. It could be minutes, it could be hours – her emotions are in such disarray that perception is something of the past. One moment she knows she is alone, in the room, in the world, maybe even in the universe and then she feels crowded as his scent inhabits the room along with his presence.

“It isn’t the end of the world. It isn’t even the end of your career, Starbuck.” So he’s going to play to the infamous ‘Starbuck.’ If she weren’t so miserable she’d laugh.

She doesn’t look at him when she replies, “But it isn’t much of a career, is it? I don’t see much opportunity for career progression, either.” She feels hollow and empty and it shows on her face.

Lee stands there for a moment, paralysed, not knowing what to do with a Kara that is devoid of any emotion. Finally he sits on the cold deck, making sure that he doesn’t touch her – lest he scare her off.

“You’re grounded. Flying a bird – according to the good doctor – it’s too taxing on the pregnancy, you could have a miscarriage – hell you could kill yourself, and truth be told that is what worries me more.”

She looks up at him, her hollow eyes telling more of the tale than her words. “So that is all I am, a pregnancy?” She feels stripped of meaning, or at least the meaning that she held before. Identity ripped from her in the moments she spent with Leoben that created this thing that inhabits her. Identity ripped in the moments that it took for the good doctor Cottle to tell her she was pregnant. Or was it ripped the second that she was grounded, or when the messenger boy Lee delivered the verdict?

It wasn’t all true though, was it? She questions herself inwardly in the silence between her and Lee. Her identity metamorphosed the moment she accepted Kacey as her own. Mother, that was what she had become, and a damn sight better in the weeks she’d had with Kacey than her own mother had managed in eighteen years.

“It isn’t forever. It’s what, nine months of pregnancy? And then however long it takes for you to get back to adequate fitness to fly levels,” Lee says as he too stares at the wall ahead of him.

“It isn’t Sam’s.” Kara says finally. She could swear that the air in the room drops by ten degrees and she picks her hands up from her lap to wrap her arms around her herself protectively.

“What happened?” His words are quietly spoken, but they are not soft, and that gives more meaning than if he shouted. He’s angry and he has every reason to be.

“Leoben had me in some kind of house. He wanted me to love him.” She shakes her head gently as she speaks, her inner mind seeing the dollhouse he kept her in. “I killed him in so many different ways. A part of me began hating myself. I kept killing him and he kept returning, concerned for me.” She drops her head as she remembers the way he treated her.

“You do realize that it was false concern, he wanted you to break. You did remember that?” There is an air of desperation in his voice; he has moved from his previous position until he is on his knees facing her. He wants to grab her by the shoulders and shake her into sense, but knows that would be the wrong tack to take with her.

“I hurt him, Lee. I tortured him and he let me do it, he did that for me. I don’t understand him, Lee. Why would he place me on such a pedestal to allow me to repeatedly hurt him?” She looks blankly at the wall over Lee’s shoulder.

“He’s a Cylon, Gods, he is Leoben, and he tells you truths wrapped in lies! You know this!” His voice has crept up in volume until she looks at him, seeing him properly for the first time in this exchange.

“It’s his, Lee. I don’t think I loved him, but he was so relentless and he was there. Then there was Kacey and he was so gentle with her and I saw this other side ...” She drifts off. The rest is left unspoken.

Lee sinks down, winded, hunched as though he’s been sucker-punched. In a way, he thinks to himself, he has. “So, now what do we do?” he finally utters softly.

A part of her screams to get rid of it, refusing to even acknowledge that it is a child. But the part that finally broke in two when Kacey was gently wrenched from her arms, from her life - that part of her screams and begs and pleads to keep it. It is the part of her that is winning, and winning by a mile. She runs her hand over her belly protectively, unconsciously and subtly curling inwards. Her decision, if there ever had been one to make, is made. She looks at Lee finally, the decision in her eyes.

“This child is innocent of its parents’ sins, Lee. It didn’t deserve this situation; I can’t do what Sam asked of me. Find some way out of this mess.” She swallows, takes a breath and closes her eyes. “It’s over with him. How can he love me when he would risk my life?”

Lee sits opposite her with warring emotions. He can see where Sam is coming from, what he saw and the reasons why. Lords he could see himself agreeing with Sam. He looks at Kara; there is no trace of the bravado that is Starbuck’s shield. Has Sam ever seen this aspect of Kara? Ever seen the fragility? Has he ever seen tears run down his wife’s face as she feels torn as she does now? Lee doesn’t think he has.

“Sam knows it is Leoben’s? Frak!” The statement is expelled on a held breath. Lee looks at Kara, ashen-faced.

“I neither confirmed nor denied. Hell, considering the way I’ve treated him lately, he thinks it could be any one of a dozen men’s child.” Regret tinges her words. “He suspects it though.”

“Suspecting and knowing are two entirely separate things, Kara.” Lee says, thoughts roiling as plots began to whir in his mind. His face becomes distant as he stares out of the viewing port.

“I know that look, Lee. I saw that look when Zak and I played Pyramid against you. Lords of Kobol, does that seem a long time ago.” She blows out a breath she didn’t know she had been holding. “Where do we go from here Lee? It isn’t as though we have exactly been friends, frak; you’ve looked like you wanted to kill me a few times.”

“I did,” he admits. If they are going to clear the air, he may as well be honest he figures. “You ... slept with me; we made an agreement to tell them, break it off finally and be together and the next thing I knew you were married the following morning. Did you know what you did to me?” He is angry again, but it isn’t as potent as it had been before.

“I think I saw that,” Kara says smiling, it’s a small victory, but it is there. “Your uniform could barely hold you.” She becomes quiet as a thought falls over her. “I’m going to have that problem next.” She sighs and goes over the words he has said. She had hurt him, and he was honest enough to tell her. Looking up she smiles. “Sorry, sorry for all of it.” She sags just a little and feels one of her many walls crumble, she is already letting him in, even though she could really hurt them both this time.

“Yeah, you are going to have a small issue with the uniform, I know the name of an excellent tailor though.” He laughs, but she doesn’t and it worries him just a little. He needs to lighten things up, it feels as though the conversation is a negotiation of new ground in their relationship.

Lee stands up; he doesn’t know what the next step is now that she has made her decision. Samuel T. Anders could blow her life apart if he voices his suspicions.

“Sam needs new quarters, the last I heard he wanted to be pilot. I guess it will be a good thing now that I am out of commission, just don’t ask me to be the one to train him.” Kara says finally.

“You’re thinking about adding people to the pilot roster when we have a Cylon pregnancy to cover up?” Lee looks at her, astonished, and then thinks of what he has said aloud and it gives him a moment of pause. Something he wouldn’t do for anyone else, there is still a part of him that doesn’t want to do it, even for her. It’s a Cylon for the Gods sakes, and then he sees her stricken face and he knows he really will do anything for Kara Thrace.

Later as he walks down the corridors of the hulking ship that he calls home, he finds that he can’t stop thinking. How do they dare hide this, can they get away with this? He remembers the insanity that happened with Helo’s kid and it didn’t end well. He remembers Sharon being locked in a cell and the thought that it could happen to Kara chills him. He cannot let that happen to Kara, he will not. He just has no clues as to how to protect her - especially now that Sam has left her.

Thoughts of Kara preoccupy his mind as he heads through the ship toward his own quarters, unaware of the lateness of the hour, time having frozen in conversation, in the concerns that have abounded in his mind about Kara. Before he realises it he in the long corridor that will take him to his own quarters, to the woman he married, to the life he now lives – the one that doesn’t feel like his. His steps are slow; they are lazy and reluctant, but not hesitant. He finds himself at his hatch all too soon and feels himself entering as though he is watching his own life from outside his body.


	4. Chapter Three

Chapter Three 

Kara doesn’t want to be there; the once comforting nature of sitting on the couch with the old man suddenly seems daunting. She looks at the Admiral across the desk. She sits upright, back straight, eyes unseeing – her gaze just over his shoulder at a point on the wall. She is listening to him, hearing his disappointment in tone of voice, not in words, and an icy cold numbness is spreading through her. As the Admiral stands up, so does she, frowning for a brief moment and looking at him a little closer, but as with the entire time they’ve sat in this room, the conversation has flown completely over her head.

“Dismissed.” The Admiral says, resigned, as he is looking at Kara. He isn’t holding out a hand to her, he isn’t moving more than standing behind his desk, and his immobility confuses her. It's like he is fighting between two separate emotions. She knows that he was waiting for her to return to flight status, she thinks he must feel let down, especially since he knows through the wonderful rumour mill of the ship, that she and Sam have split.

She nods,the clouds within her mind beginning to dissipate just enough to be a little more aware of the world around her. Realising what has been said she brings her hand up and snaps off a salute, turning on her heel and marching out with more confidence and energy than she has right now.

Galactica’s corridors are a quieter place after main shift has happened, but there are still people milling about, walking from place to place, some more urgent than others. Laughter echoes down the halls, meeting her ears in an alien cacophony. Something makes Kara lift her head and she glances up and sees Dee, the woman who managed to get the prize. Anyone watching would see sadness on Kara’s face. But Dee perceives it differently, sees pity where there is loss.

Dee continues down the corridor, disturbed and angered by Kara’s expression. She has heard the rumours and they begin to repeat themselves in her mind. She disregards the fact that Kara is pregnant; if anything it is another thing that angers her about Kara. Kara got pregnant whilst she seems to have failed. She has heard the rumours that Lee is circling around Kara, that Sam has left Kara and the last thing she is supposed to have said was that the child was hers no matter the father. That piece is something that really gets her mind racing. What if that child is Lee’s?

It isn’t a question that is new to her; she’s spent days thinking it over, from the moment that she heard it. Now that Kara has looked at her pityingly, the puzzle pieces are beginning to fall into place. She continues on past Kara, blindly passing others as thoughts run riot in her mind. She enters her quarters and slams the hatch behind her, the clang reverberating in the metal room, but Dee pays it no heed. She walks to where they keep their ambrosia and Chief’s brew and grabs a tumbler and a bottle before sitting on the couch that lines one side of their quarters. She pours more than a couple fingers worth in a glass and downs it in one. Feeling more relaxed she pours herself another glass and leans back into the corner of the couch, crosses her legs and toes the coffee table absent minded, waiting for him to return.

Drink after drink passes before he walks in, dress blues open at the neck, hair in every direction. It’s obvious even to her that he has had a rough day at the office; it isn’t in her to care. All she can think of is that he has slept with Her, that she will smell Her when he kisses her and she cannot stand the thought. She takes another swig of whatever viper fuel she is drinking, trying to burn her memory away.

She’s drunk and unlike other women, Dee bypasses giggles and fun, no she hits up belligerent, accusatory and depressed. Her insecurity in this relationship has always been her worst feature to him, and now she is going to hit him with it full force, because she’s right. She saw it in that bitch’s eyes as she passed her. Knows that Starbuck has won the man she loves and she could never compete.

“So Dee, you had as bad a day.” He is undressing in their quarters, and she is watching, and then she is doing more. She is raking her eyes over him, not in a lustful way, not in the manner of a wife. She is scouring him and trying to find some physical evidence of his indiscretion.

“Yeah, something like that.” She is beginning to slur her words and it’s that which brings Lee upright.

He backs away from the locker where he has stored his uniform, and he stares at his normally straight-laced wife, normally more reserved with the alcohol than him, and he knows something is wrong. For a moment he just stands there looking at her a little closer and realizes that she is not relaxing on the couch, but in a position that once looked like she had been relaxing and is nearer now to slumped, that the coffee table normally so well positioned in front of the couch is now at an angle. Things are definitely not good.

“When were you going to tell me, then?” She finally speaks, but somehow manages to surprise herself with how muted her voice sounds. Inside her she wants to scream, but apparently her drunkenness is not helping things as she feels tears begin to fall.

“What?!” The lack comprehension of what she is talking about shows in his expression and it begins to fuel her.

“Kara, that baby she is carrying. It’s yours!” She is screaming at him and it is no doubt heard outside.

“What in the gods’ names are you talking about, who gave you that impression?” He can’t begin to think straight, but he moves towards her. He holds his hands out, almost imploring her. The glass she was holding flies towards him, smashing on the corner of the hatch, shards flying back into the room. She stands shaking, wild-eyed and absolutely enraged, but completely unaware of the shock on her husband’s face. Good-natured, always there, the good rock in rough seas Dee is not here today.

“I didn’t need to be told, I saw her today. You should have seen the way she looked at me Lee, she pitied me! I knew she was pregnant. Frak! The whole ship knows that, and the fact that Sam isn’t the father. We all knew her vows meant nothing, but I thought ours did!” And as soon as the anger arrived it departs and leaves her sobbing on the floor. Lee has no idea what is going on, only that his father sent down word that Kara was grounded indefinitely. He has no idea how the two crossed paths, but on a ship this small anything is possible.

“Dee,” Lee begins, but cannot find anything to say. Moving slowly he approaches her, kneels on the floor and tries to wrap his arms around her.

“No! No, you don’t get to try that; ‘It’s all in your head, Dee.’ No.” She roughly shoves his arms away from her before moving and scrabbling away from him. There is nothing dignified in her heartbreak, but then again there is nothing dignified in what is left of her marriage.

Lee stands up and realizes he is in his briefs and socks; clothing seemed so trivial a few moments ago and now it occupies a space in his mind that had been for Dee. He walks to the locker again, and pulls on some sweats, and grabs a clean uniform and an overnight bag, neatly folding his clothes as he goes. As he folds his dress blues he looks up, he sees Dee sitting on their bed, folded up, staring at him darkly.

“Going to go frak your whore, are you?” It’s spat at him, it’s dark and ugly. It’s an accusation borne of hurt and one Lee will not respond to in kind.

“I think we need some cool-off time, I am going to bunk with the pilots. You’ll find me in their bunkrooms if you need me.” Lee schools his voice into gentle civility, then leaves.

* * *   
There is a fever pitch mood on the deck: cubits, for all their worth, are being exchanged, excited voices rising and laughter filling the space. Kara is late as ever to the dance, watching the scene below from the crowded catwalk, searching for a couple of people out of all those assembled. Her shortened hair frames her face like a halo as she watches the tableau below, a smile breaking out as she spots Helo, at least. Making short work of the steps that lead her to the deck she squeezes as best as possible between people. She isn’t showing just yet, but she’s already getting protective of her mid-section.

“If it isn’t the fighting Agathons, huh?” Kara’s smile is huge and teasing as she says it. Her Starbuck persona is riding high.

“Starbuck, late to the party as usual.” It’s a slight admonishment, and more a tease amongst friends. Kara smiles a full beam smile and talks straight to Helo, who will be waking up with a few bruises in the morning

“At least I got here in time to watch you kick the CAG’s ass.” She is going to enjoy watching it, too. It has been a while since she spoke to Lee and she hoped they had laid some of their baggage to rest, but perhaps, she thinks, she was wrong.

“He’s a tough little frakker, I’ll give him that. He’s springing like he’s got it in for me.” Helo finally weighs in, mind completely on the game, washing his mouth out with water, placing the bite guard in his mouth and going into the fray. Kara watches for a moment and has a sudden urge to throw her own tags into the box; she could stand to go at it with Lee. She feels as though she has been frozen out after all he had said, and the longer he has left it, the angrier she has become.

“Stay off the ropes!” Sharon calls after her husband and Kara regards the other woman and realizes that the only marriage that looks like it is going the distance is the one between her best friend and a Cylon.

In seconds it is all over, and Lee is on the mats being counted out. Kara yells out when Cottle deems him unfit to continue this fight. Helo wins - not that he wouldn’t have, but to Kara it seems like a cop-out win. Helo takes his victory and Sharon wraps her arms around him, their assured smiles in place. Things are looking good for Helo later on. Kara, however, cannot let sleeping dogs lay and hunts down Lee.

“Good fight. Bit off a little more than you can chew, huh?” She begins goading, hiding the hurt that in the past few weeks since she confided in him, he hasn’t once spoken to her. It is something that he continues as he walks off with a dark look towards her.

“Don’t be that way. Stick around, the night’s young – you might still get the chance to paste some green nugget into the mats.” She leaves off the obvious, or have them paste you, but the implication hangs in the air.

“Well I guess then you’ll just have to enjoy it without me.” His voice is cold, and holds not a small amount of irritation.

“Pulling your tags out so soon?” Kara teases, but there is nothing friendly, all that hurt had to go somewhere and with Kara it has been poured into anger.

“I’m done, Kara.” He sounds worn out and in a way he is. It is the constant push and pull between Kara and Dee. Whilst Dee is his wife, he can’t seem to help himself where Kara is concerned.

“I can’t offer you a fight to get your frustrations out, Apollo. I think we can both thank the Cylons for that.” It’s bitterness and frustration poured into one sentence and it’s whispered into his ears. Lee turns to Kara, exhaling like a balloon letting go of its air.

“We can’t talk here, there are too many people. We can’t leave together for the same reason, so this will have to wait.” Kara feels as though she has been slapped and is tempted again to throw her tags into the box, give him a taste of his own medicine.

“No, we talk this out now. I have plenty to hear from you; not least of all why after telling you I am pregnant you leave me high and dry. I don’t get it, Lee. The thing is I could really do with the people who promise to stick with me through this actually being there.” Kara’s hurt begins to show on her face, and Lee suddenly realizes just how much pregnancy has altered her.

“I know when I left I said I would be there for you, but things happened.” He looks at her and he doesn’t know what to say, so much is going on in his head, his heart and his marriage and they are all pulling him in separate directions.

From afar two other sets of eyes watch them in their verbal duel. Sam looks resigned; he has known that this was coming down the line, that there is too much between them. He is calm as he watches it, the woman beside him less than so. She goes rigid and the anger thrumming through her curls her hands into fists, as she makes noises and does everything it takes to not walk over and make this more of a scene. They both know that the paternity of the child Kara is carrying has now gone from unknown to confirmed. Anastasia Dualla knows that in the halls of Galactica tomorrow it will be more than just the pitying eyes of Kara Thrace that she will have to deal with, and it isn’t an idea she wants to think about.


	5. Chapter Five

Chapter Four

The gym is darkened and there is a sole occupant punching the bag as hard as he possibly can, sweat pouring down his back and his breathing laboured. His focus so swept up in the rhythmic pounding that his fists are providing on the tethered leather that he never notices the larger man lean in the hatch way, watching him.

“So what did she do this time?” 

Lee looks up from the heavy bag to the voice that has spoken and finally notices Helo standing, arms crossed and a resigned look upon his face.

“Kara's pregnant. The ship knows. Sam walked because it isn't his.” He wasn't betraying her, and it was pretty much a list of everything that the crew of Galactica knew anyhow.

“Yeah, but Sam wouldn't have walked if it were just anyone's.” Helo is blunt and gets to the point. Moving across the room he holds the heavy bag as Lee resumes hitting it.

“It isn't mine, Helo.” Lee feels guilty about breaking Kara's confidence, but part of him is anxious about the situation.

“I know, I knew from the moment she came to me. I know it’s Leoben's.” 

Lee looks at Helo in surprise, his arms falling to his sides as though they are weighted with lead. “How do I deal with this? I don't want to leave her on her own, but a hybrid? How do you deal with that?” He is less put together as he usually is, his mind in so many places it is reflected in his speech.

“Hera was as loved as any child ever has been. Still scared us both. Losing Hera was the worst thing that has happened to me after the attacks, but if I were offered the opportunity to have Hera in my life again, would I take it? Yes, absolutely.” Helo watches Lee as he considers the other man's experience.

“Then there is this whole thing between me and Kara. Gods, everything keeps coming back to Kara. I keep trying to have relationships with other women and it never works, she is always there.” Lee walks to one of the benches used for bench presses and sits, blindly unwrapping his hands and coming to conclusions in his own mind.

“You and Kara can't see beyond your noses where each other are concerned.” Helo laughs, but he is the only one laughing.

“You’re right,” Lee says finally. “We seem to bounce back to each other, no matter what happens. ” Lee stands up, smiles and pats Helo on the back. “Thanks.” Lee walks out of the gym, leaving Helo behind.

“You're welcome,” Helo mumbles. “I dunno what for, but I’ll take the credit.” He laughs and moves to the exercise equipment and starts his own workout.   
* * *

“Be careful now Lee, there is going to be talk after our little chat at the dance.” Her voice is disembodied and slightly muffled as Kara lays on her back under a Viper.

“They already is, Kara. I doubt at this point in time it will matter what we do,” Lee replies as he drops down to the floor to join Kara.

“Fine, but if Dee makes you sleep on the couch, I had no part in it, this was all your idea,” Kara teases, smiling as she replaces a spark plug.

“I've been sleeping on the real couch for a while now.” His voice sounds tired as he says it but it's the truth.

“Real as compared to…?” Kara looks up at him slightly confused, her mind focused on the literal.

“The metaphorical.” His words hang in the air.

Kara sits up and looks down at Lee as he too comes out from under her Viper, shock colouring her her features. She has no idea what to say and the uncertainty falls across her eyes. She stares and silence passes between them.

“I didn't know she had kicked you out.”

“She didn't. She didn't need to.” He looks Kara in the eyes and it is as open a conversation as they have ever had.

“Oh.” It's quiet and muted and she looks at Lee, trying to fathom this new topography in their relationship. The silence doesn't last long, though.

“Perhaps we should continue this some other time, like the CAG's office at 2200 hours?” Lee reassures himself that he didn't ask her, he repeats it to himself in the short time it takes for Kara to respond.

“Are you asking me out?” She's teasing him and it reminds him of the time that she came back from Caprica with Helo and Athena.

“You're dreaming,” he responds, teasing back.

“You are,” she leans forward and whispers to him.

“I take it back, I never said a thing,” he returns. It’s almost like a sport with them. He turns and begins to walk away, laughing.

“Oh, there are no takebacks, Lee. I thought you had learned that by now.”

He laughs at her. “I was hoping you were going to say that.” His voice is light and in the moment, and then the moment seems to the outward world to end. “CAG's office, 2200.”

He says it like an order, but Kara knows better, the smile hasn't left her face. She knows far better. He has always been the one concerned about outward appearance.

* * *

Lee walks the corridors of Galactica with a sense of tiredness, his shift having ended half an hour previous and all he can think of getting to his office. He’s been staying there since he walked out on Ana. As he walks he begins to unbutton his uniform, the collar now feeling as though it is strangling him. He reaches his hatch, opens the door and steps into the darkness. Flicking a light on, the room is illuminated as he walks to the couch and dumps his jacket on it. He stares at the small coffee table in front of the couch and notices an envelope.

He picks it up and realises that it weighs more than it had given the appearance of whilst sat on the coffee table. Sitting down on the couch he opens the envelope and the officious paper spills its se-crets. Absent-mindedly Lee pushes a blanket away as he reads page after page, each moment won-dering how he ever knew the person who had instigated them. He is so involved in the details that he is oblivious to the sound of Kara entering the room and closing the hatch behind her.

“Is there something so inherently fascinating about reports that you don't hear people walking in the room?” Kara says finally, making Lee jump. He stares at her and then he blinks and brings himself back to the moment.

“Not a report.” He offers it up to her and she picks it up from his hand. Flipping it over she begins to read and her eyes slowly widen.

“Wow. She was fast.” Kara thumbs through the papers, seeing her future as she does. “She beat out Sammy and we have been busted up longer than you guys.” She looks up and down at Lee who is just staring at her. She moves her mouth, trying to say something, but nothing comes to mind.

“I think I'll take the shovel from you now, save you from digging yourself any deeper.” He smiles at her awkwardness. He gently takes the divorce papers from her hands, tilting his head to the space on the couch beside him.

“What happened, Lee?” Kara says quietly.

“We made mistakes, married for the wrong reason,” he says. He's speaking for himself and Dee, but it could be said for Kara and Sam in his mind. He would never blatantly say that though.

“I was scared.” 

Lee looks up to Kara, almost not believing his ears. “Scared?”

“Yeah, I met Sam on Caprica and it made me feel like the end of the worlds hadn't happened, that it was all some drill. Then I brought him back and it was … different. There was a thrill for a while, and then I realised I wasn't shaken by him. I kiss you and it feels like an earthquake. Around you I find I want to do the impossible, I could take on the universe and the Gods and come out victori-ous.” She blows out a breath and steals a look at him and sees his eyebrows are raised. She fidgets with her hands and silence sits between them.

“You scare me Lee, whatever is between us scares me. It's the reason I ran off and married Sam – talk about your wrong reasons – Gods!” She exclaims as she stands and begins pacing in the small room.

“I scare you?” Disbelief colours his voice.

“Yeah, because, since I have known you, no matter what I do, you always turn up – even if it is to rub my nose in it.” She stops for a moment, stops talking, stops moving. “I am slowly realising something about you Lee, or maybe it is us. We can scream and shout, but somehow we can't really push each other away. We're like singularities.”

“Singularities. Since when did you know 50 cubit words like that,” Lee jokes back, trying to lighten the atmosphere. He relaxes back on the couch as he smiles.

“It's true though.” She looks at Lee, watching him as he sits. “The big problem is one day you're not going to be there. Sam's left, Zak left, my dad left. Gods am I even fit to be a mother given the only mother I had …” she leaves off as she realises what she is about to say, knowing her voice has given her away.

“What about your mother?” Lee looks warily at Kara.

“She, she hit me as a kid. I probably deserved a lot of it. I wasn't perfect.” She shrugs her shoulders dismissively and in that moment Lee realises that beyond what happened with her mother, he needs to allay her fears.

“You are not going to recreate the past. I am not your father, you did not kill Zak, irrespective of what you think you did to Zak, and Sam is a jock and an idiot for even walking away. You have done your worst to me, and certainly I did my worst right back, but here we are.” Lee looks Kara in the eye, raising her chin so her eyes meet his, her uncertainty palpable. He kisses her forehead before continuing.

“As you say, we are singularities, we define and explain the laws of gravity and relationships. I'm not going anywhere. Gods where is there to go? Really, there is nowhere physically for me to go!” He laughs when he thinks of it, then looks at Kara and sees the tears rolling down her face as she has her arms wrapped around herself. Lee pulls her to him, wrapping her in his arms tightly, kissing the crown of her head “It will be okay, we will get through this.”


	6. Epilogue

Epilogue

 

Kara sits at the clearing and brushes the dirt from the stone monument, as her mind drifts back. She thinks about Sam, who returned after being killed in a storm swearing blind that he had seen Earth and was going to guide them. He had passed the 'Cylon detector' that Baltar had put together, it was only later that they realised he not only was a Cylon, but had passed because he was different from Cylons they had previously seen.

Kara thinks on the events that transpired, of the 'final five', found Earth at the directions she pro-vided when Sam had come to her saying there was something wrong or different with the Viper. Finally they had found this planet, this new home and all because some frakker had jolted into Kara as she had typed the jump co-ordinates. That was how Galactica alone had found their home Earth.

Kara smiled, it was as the fates she thinks, and smiles just a little bit more. The fates gifted her Tha-lie and Lee and a life she never thought she could ever have nd how they found their new Earth. She thinks of the friends they lost and the ones that they have created a family with. She smiles, stands and moves away, remembering those that aren't with her. She leaves in her wake a wreath and a sadness that so many could not have made it, looking at the date on the memorial, she shakes her head – it is hard to believe it has only been a couple years since they settled here.

* * *

Grass sways around their legs as they walk up the hill, the breeze taking the edge off of the heat that the day has wrought upon them. Ahead is a small child no more than three or four, dancing to music only she can hear, blonde hair flying hither and thither. Her mother smiles beatifically at the child, motherhood giving her a patience she’s never had. Ahead of them is a house, behind them a valley with a bubbling freshwater stream and flat grassland.

The two of them are joined by a man who loops his arms around the mother's waist. It is a loving gesture and it is also supportive. Her size makes the hill a more difficult prospect than usual. The young child reaches the dwelling and beckons for her parents to come home. Mother and father laugh and walk as fast as they both can.

As they reach the top of the hill, Lee feels Kara's back stiffen. He looks at her face and sees that her expression also bears some of the tension her body is showing. He follows her gaze and sees the reason for her tension, and feels some of the worry that she’s no doubt feeling.

“I have to talk to him.” Kara said quietly.

“Why? I know he’s Thalie's father, but ...” Lee drifts off. He has always assumed that the concep-tion of Thalie wasn't exactly romantic.

“It will be fine. He won't hurt me.” There is a strength Kara's voice that Lee knows he doesn't have in this particular situation. Kara looks at Lee and smiles. “He never did, and it is a situation I am doing my best to bury as deeply as I can. The best we can do is just deal with him.” Lee looks at Kara and doesn't even know what to say.

They reach the top of the hill and their home. Lee looks at Kara and notices that her jaw is set and realises that he won't be able to sway her. Thalie looks at the man and whilst she is not afraid, she knows that he is different. Lee walks up behind the little girl he has called his since before her birth and scoops her up into his arms, walking around Leoben as the man stares at the child who has some of his own features. Lee walks into the home he and Kara have made to questions from his daughter about the blonde man at their door.

“Just someone your mama knows,” he replies and hopes it will quell the little girl’s questions. What he doesn't know is that Leoben projects that he is their protector and he is only there to ensure that her mama, her daddy and herself are safe and well. She doesn't question her daddy's explanation, and he thinks he is the one that answered her.

“Leoben,” Kara says, her posture stiff as if she’s expecting something from him.

“She's mine,” Leoben says reverently.

“She is my child. Lee and I are her parents and that is all she has ever known. I am not changing that for your frakked up so-called love for me.” Kara feels her hackles rise as he watches her and eyes the obvious swell of her abdomen.

“I was wrong.” It's a gentle admission.

“She doesn't know you are her father, Lee is the only father she has ever known. Athena helps her with the Cylon aspects of herself,” Kara says, looking Leoben in the eye. Over his shoulder she sees Thalie looking out the window at herself and Leoben.

“You're a family. I always saw her in the stream, knew she was mine even. When I saw that you would hold me in your arms and tell me you loved me I thought we would be together.” He looks at her, but it is plain to see that he has given up now he has seen the family.

“So now what?” Kara asks, relaxing.

“So now I move on, like you. I move on, but I will be watching out for you all. I don't want any-thing or anyone hurting her, Kara, that includes the new child, yourself and her daddy. I just want to be around enough to make sure she is safe and well. I won't abduct her.” He goes from resigned planning to pleading for more than exclusion.

“I can't stop you, I don't really have the means. I do ask that you are only ever on the periphery. I think you owe me that much.” Kara stands her ground, she knows deep down that this is the very most she will ever give him.

“That's fair. I wish you well, Kara.” He walks past her, not touching her, knowing that it is unwel-come, and heads towards the river and the forest that is off in the distance.

Kara exhales, lets go of the past, lets go of the moment that she had known was going to happen and walks into the home she has made with Lee. Smiling, she raises a hand when he looks up from setting the kettle over the fire. He remains there, fussing over it for a moment more before standing and walking over to Kara and kissing her softly.

“Is everything all right?” He looks into her eyes to see if she is troubled, she smiles gently.

“Yes, everything is fine, he just wants to watch out for us all. I told him that was fine, so long as he was on the periphery,” Kara says, looking Lee in the eye.

He nods and wraps an arm around her shoulders, pulling her into a one arm hug, the most he really can do, given the lateness in her second pregnancy. Thalie gets up from her perch at the window and walks to her parents, she looks at them both and then hugs her mother’s legs – not yet tall enough to get much higher. Kara looks with her mind’s eye at the life she has now, and realises this was the best that she could have dreamed of, and knows deep down that she is truly blessed.


End file.
